While there is the occasional radical voice within the gun control movement who suggests something like this, no mainstream Democratic politician has come close to saying it. In fact, both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton expressly rejected the idea that they had any interest in any sort of gun collection program.

The NRA then proceeds to list example after example of prominent Democrat politicians supporting gun confiscation; including several quotes from Barack Obama.

The Brevard County Sheriff’s Office launched an investigation and undercover operation in response to an ad posted online that read, “I would like to try necrophilia and cannibalism and see how it feels to take a life.” Investigators arrested a Texas man after he showed up to the meet with a knife and trash bags.

Our EMT students are beginning to learn about hemorrhage control this week. One of the most common mistakes in the usage of strap/windlass tourniquets such as the CAT and SOFT-T is failure to adequately tighten the strap prior to twisting the windlass. A student snapped this video of faculty member David Fifer demonstrating this concept on student volunteer Jon-Evan Ardeshir using a Doppler device.
Posted by EKU Paramedic Degree Program on Thursday, October 18, 2018

]]>https://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/2018/10/21/tourniquet-tip-strap-pressure/feed/0558“Okay, Now I Actually Do Want To Take Your Guns” – A Fiskinghttps://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/2018/05/19/okay-now-i-actually-do-want-to-take-your-guns-a-fisking/
https://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/2018/05/19/okay-now-i-actually-do-want-to-take-your-guns-a-fisking/#commentsSat, 19 May 2018 14:19:23 +0000https://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/?p=481Continue reading]]>I’ll try my hand at this fisking thing I see all the cool kids doing, like WEERD and Larry Correia.

The mask came off over at Esquire, yesterday, in the wake of a school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas. I won’t be commenting on the shooting itself because the details are still filtering in. As usual, the news agencies are all rushing to be first, rather than correct.

Listen, I know the moments after a gunman opens fire in a school are hectic for you. You have to get your talking points together…

Not really. The arguments have stayed the same for well over a decade, when I first started taking an interest in guns.

you have to mentally prepare to debate a traumatized yet sensible child,

Yes, trauma victim and child are what I correlate with sensible. I notice he didn’t use the word rational.

you have to look at yourself in the mirror and practice saying that more guns would have made the situation less deadly. It’s a busy time!

It’s hard to say, in this specific circumstance, if having an armed teacher, guard, or law enforcement officer right there would have helped. Not only because all the details aren’t known yet, but it very likely wouldn’t have hurt. Having an effective means of defense certainly beats cowering in fear with no other option.

And since we are always either in the moments after or the moments before a mass shooting, you’re pretty much always busy, I have noticed!

I suppose it depends on how he defines moments or mass shooting. If you recall, the last mass shooting in the news was in Australia, the country with gun control laws anti-rights advocates always swoon over. However, mass shootings are exceedingly rare. In a world with seven billion people, we only hear about these events a few times a year.

before a mass shooting, you’re pretty much always busy, I have noticed!

Anyway, I just wanted to drop you a line and let you know that I now actually do want to take your guns.

All of your guns.

Right now.

Yeah, I’m not really shocked by this. For years gun-rights advocates have warned that total confiscation was the end-goal of the anti-rights side. We’ve been called crazy and told over and over that “Nobody wants to take your guns,” only for politicians and radicals to give a wink and a nod and try to do exactly that.

It wasn’t always this way. I have responsible gun owners in my family. I’ve never been a fan of shooting at things myself, but guns sure do seem to have brought joy into the lives of some people I love, and as long as they were stored properly, I never had a problem with them being around. I believed that we should place a hurdle or two between a psychopath and an AR-15, but that’s about as ardent as I got. Live and let live, that was my policy. Even with death machines.

This is another near-trope from anti-rights activists. This one is a cousin to “I support the second amendment, but…” Dave Holmes would have people believe that he was about “live and let live” for firearms before this tragic event, and quietly omits the earlier anti-gun articles he’s written. Articles like:

I’m supposed to believe, after writing anti-rights drivel for years, that he’s actually had a live-and-let-live policy on guns all this time. Excuse me if I find Dave to be disingenuous just two full paragraphs into the opinion piece.

That has all changed. And you changed it.

And by “changed,” he of course means restating his long-held beliefs that haven’t changed at all. And by “you changed it” he means he’s blaming the NRA and civil-rights activists and not the actual criminals to blame.

you have had the opportunity to work with the vast majority of Americans who support the sensible reform of our gun laws. You have had the chance to preserve your own rights as we work together to keep our gun regulations in step with gun technology. You haven’t.

So in other words, “You could have had the chance to surrender your rights bit by bit.”

All along, there have been opportunities for sensible, incremental changes.

Called it.

This year alone, we could have banned the manufacture of bump stocks, which turn semi-automatic weapons into automatic ones.

Never mind that Sessions is actually banning bump stocks through regulation. That’s not how bump-fire works. I understand Dave is ignorant to the voodoo that makes up the “evil guns,” but words mean things, and the words he used don’t actually line up with what he’s saying. Bump stocks make bump firing a gun easier. But it’s already easy to do without one. It’s a pointless, poorly worded ban that will end up hurting a large swath of gun owners that use things like match-grade triggers in their hunting rifles. But I suppose he doesn’t really care.

We could have raised the minimum age for gun ownership from 18 to 21, or instate a national minimum age for long-gun ownership.

So I suppose Dave would support raising the voting age and enlistment age to 21 as well, right? I mean, if it’s too dangerous for 18-year-olds to own a means to protect themselves, then I guess it’s too dangerous for them to join the military where they can hold actual automatic weapons. Or help decide the person in charge of what countries we bomb. If he doesn’t think voting is just as dangerous as owning a gun, Dave should ask himself, “Am I happy with the current elected president of the United States?”

These teens that are too dangerous to own a gun; are they the same teens we’re supposed to be listening to about public policy?

What you have done is double down. What you’ve done is convince your members that the occasional school shooting, the odd literal slaughter of innocents, is an unfortunate but inevitable quirk of American life, a thing that is necessary to preserve freedom.

On the contrary; our side has argued for stronger safety measures in schools, better enforcement of NICS (because if we’re gonna have a system, dammit, then it should at least not leak like a sieve), de-stigmatization of mental health treatment (hint: blackballing social security recipients that are no danger to anyone is called stigmatizing), and offered several solutions to help prevent shootings.

You have taken to our television screens to tell us that the world is an apocalyptic hellscape,

Apocalyptic hellscape, huh? Seeing as how we’re at a near 20 year low for violent crime, I shudder to ask what he thinks the 90s were like.

and that the only way to be safe from gun violence is to stock our homes with guns.

No. There’s never going to be a 100% cure-all for any violence, gun-related or not. Evil exists. But it’s sure a heck of a lot easier to scare off or stop a bad guy if you have a gun with you. So no, “stock our homes with guns,” is not what I’d recommend. Carry your gunis what I’d recommend. It’s called POGO: pants on, gun on.

You pushed legislation that cut funding from the Centers for Disease Control for research on gun safety in America. Research that might conclude that fewer guns would mean fewer gun deaths, which leaves us with…no meaningful research on gun violence in America. Our ongoing studies on car safety have made cars, roads and highways safer—not without risk, but safer—yet no comparable studies can be done on guns.

Oh, you mean the same CDC that was spending government funding on biased gun control “studies?” The same CDC that buried survey data for nearly 20 years; Data that may suggest guns can be used to save lives? Yeah, why wouldn’t we want to reward a group like that with funding? It’s a mystery.

Here’s what you get for that.

If you watch nothing else about the mass shooting at #SantaFe High School in Texas, watch this.

That’s called an appeal to emotion. Yes, what happened in Texas yesterday was criminal and horrible. It would be just as easy to lay the blame at his feet for blocking efforts and solutions offered by pro-rights advocates.

The young people of America are now expecting to witness gun violence in their schools. They are sitting in trigonometry waiting for the other shoe to drop, except the shoe can shoot 400 rounds a minute. That’s the result of all your hard work. There’s your prize. Stand up and take it!

I’ve already linked above about how exceedingly rare school shootings are. And about how historically low the violent-crime rate is in America, right now. But he’s not talking about facts, he’s talking about feelings and perceptions. Do you think the 24/7 news coverage of events may have something to do with that? That maybe constantly bombarding kids with talk about “March for your lives” might worry them a bit? That’s not my side doing that.

Please also get a load of this guy.

Guns and prayers: A man shows up to the Santa Fe High School (Texas) shooting with an American flag and a gun. Another man says “it’s an embarrassment.” pic.twitter.com/TAixNrJCPp

This morning, as an active shooter situation unfolded in his town, this guy decided to show up on the scene with a MAGA hat, a full-size American flag and a pistol on his hip, to…I guess attempt to be a hero? This is what your relentless fear-mongering gets us all: an adult human being taking a gun to a school to be helpful.

Yeah, I’ll give him that. This guy was not helping.

I was stunned and sad after Parkland. I was heartened by the efforts of the young people who watch their friends get murdered in front of them. I watched you make nice with them on CNN and then, behind their backs, call them terrorists. And then this morning I watched the same goddamn thing happen again, only this time at a high school in Santa Fe, Texas, where at least ten people are dead. As though all of the marching and organizing and common-sense talking had never happened. As though this ever growing pile of young bodies is worth nothing.

Oh, it’s not as if it never happened. NRA membership is thought to be at near record levels in response to, among others, David Hogg and Emma Gonzalez. They keep saying thing like “[Remove] semi-automatic weapons from our Civilian society,” (so millions of legally owned handguns, hunting rifles, and shotguns on top of the much-hated AR-15 and other so-called “assault weapons”).

So now I’m angry. Now I’m finished trying to reason with you.

It’s funny how by “reason with” he actually means “tell you to do what I want without listening to you.”

So now I, a guy who was ambivalent about guns just a few years ago, want to take your guns away.

Dave sure writes a lot of anti-gun rhetoric for a guy that was ambivalent about guns

All of them. I want to take them all and melt them down and shape them into a giant sphere and then push it at you so you have to run away from it like Indiana Jones for the rest of your lives. I want Ted Nugent to roam the halls of his gunless house, sighing wearily until he dies.

I want to end this thing once and for all, so that all of you who have prioritized the sale of guns over the lives of children have to sit quietly and think about what you’ve done.

I know Dave isn’t familiar with who Gary Kleck is, or the fact that more people are saved through defensive gun use every day than there are innocent people killed; that the hypothesis of more guns equal more crime has been proven demonstrably false. We don’t “prioritize the sale of guns over the lives of children,” Dave. Quite the opposite. As J.R.R. Tolkien wrote so eloquently in The Two Towers, “I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.” We fight to save our rights so that we have the ability to fight to save lives.

God help me, I want to take all of your guns out of your hands, by myself, right now.

For the unaware, calling someone a daisy in this context is a compliment. It’s saying that if you accomplish something, you are truly worth of notice. (Guide to Doc Holliday Slang)

It won’t happen, of course. So let’s meet in the middle. Let’s meet at…literally anything

Ah. The old “compromise” gambit. LawDog wrote a wonderful post about the “Cake of Gun Rights.” It was also adapted into a comic. By “meet in the middle,” he actually means “give up only some of your rights this time.” Sadly, I doubt he actually means “literally anything,” because my idea of a solution has been rejected by him and those like him as “delusional” over and over.

It’s happening. We tried it your way, and it really did not work.

No, we never “tried it my way.” In fact, my way was and is continually rejected by him. In places where it has been tried, like Utah, which allows teachers with concealed carry permits to be armed, I haven’t heard of a school shooting yet.

Six armed men broke into a Jacksonville, Florida mobile home on Sunday, April 15th. One man yelled out, “Sheriff’s Office!” before the door burst in and at least one masked gunman entered the home and fired a shot. Of the four residents, two reportedly armed themselves with a 9mm handgun and an AR-15, returning fire. The attackers soon fled, with several of the wounded being captured by police in a vehicle speeding away from the scene.

“Never handle firearms carelessly. The sorrow and suffering that have been caused through the innocent but heedless handling of firearms by the young! Only four days ago, right in the next farm house to the one where I am spending the summer, a grandmother, old and gray and sweet, one of the loveliest spirits in the land, was sitting at her work, when her young grandson crept in and got down an old, battered, rusty gun which had not been touched for many years and was supposed not to be loaded, and pointed it at her, laughing and threatening to shoot. In her fright she ran screaming and pleading toward the door on the other side of the room; but as she passed him he placed the gun almost against her very breast and pulled the trigger! He had supposed it was not loaded. And he was right – it wasn’t. So there wasn’t any harm done. It is the only case of that kind I ever heard of. Therefore, just the same, don’t you meddle with old unloaded firearms; they are the most deadly and unerring things that have ever been created by man. You don’t have to take any pains at all with them; you don’t have to have a rest, you don’t have to have any sights on the gun, you don’t have to take aim, even. No, you just pick out a relative and bang away, and you are sure to get him. A youth who can’t hit a cathedral at thirty yards with a Gatling gun in three quarters of an hour, can take up an old empty musket and bag his grandmother every time, at a hundred. Think what Waterloo would have been if one of the armies had been boys armed with old muskets supposed not to be loaded, and the other army had been composed of their female relations. The very thought of it makes one shudder.”

– Mark Twain

Kathy Jackson of Cornered Cat quoted that on Facebook the other day and I thought it was too good not to share. It’s from an essay written by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) entitled, “Advice to Youth.” It’s a wonderful bit of humor mixed with truth and satire.

]]>https://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/2018/02/27/good-guy-with-an-ar-15-stops-attacker/feed/0371Here We Go Again – IL Assault Weapon Banhttps://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/2018/02/26/here-we-go-again-il-assault-weapon-ban/
https://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/2018/02/26/here-we-go-again-il-assault-weapon-ban/#respondMon, 26 Feb 2018 10:32:26 +0000http://blog.snoozebuttonronin.com/?p=355Continue reading]]> Senator Ira Silverstein (D) from the 8th district introduced another assault weapons ban, SB3297. While it’s no SAFE act, it contains plenty of its own stumbles, inanities, unreasonableness. If you guessed his district is in Chicago, you’re right. Apparently the assault weapons ban that already covers his entire district isn’t strict enough for his liking. He introduced this new bill two days after the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Florida. The bill is currently waiting without any apparent traction. Perhaps it will wither in committee like many of its predecessors have before.

The format of the bill is the same as the last several bills that have passed through various government bodies. For the quick overview, the bill defines assault weapons by evil features, includes the usual list of firearms banned by name (with some new additions), creates a new term “Assault weapon attachment” it criminalizes transferring a .50 BMG rifle, assault weapon transfers, transfers of magazines holding more than 10 rounds.

The evil features for semi-auto rifles are being able to accept a “Large capacity ammunition feeding device” and ONE of the following:

“Only a pistol grip without a stock attached” (yes, I know, other than an SBR, it’s pretty much the defining characteristic of “not a rifle”)

“Any feature capable of functioning as a protruding grip that can be held by the non-trigger hand” (interesting choice to ban vertical and angled foregrips)

“Folding, telescoping, or thumbhole stock” (a classic – they hate guns that will fit in your trunk, can be used by both tall and short people, or are comfortable to hold)

“A shroud attached to the barrel, or that partially or completely encircles the barrel, allowing the bearer to hold the firearm with the non-trigger hand without being burned, but excluding a slide that encloses the barrel”

Handguards– The bill bans handguards; even though they specifically identified the intended and legitimate use of handguards, or “shrouds” as they are labeled in the bill. Handguards prevent people from hurting themselves while using a firearm. Somehow, personal protective equipment is a banned feature. Do they hope to stop potential mass shooters by burning their hands? I guess a ban on oven-mitts will be forthcoming.

Oddly enough, a semi-auto rifle with a fixed magazine that takes more than ten rounds becomes an assault weapon outright, no matter what features it does or doesn’t have. There’s a situation where you would legally be able to transfer a post-ban rifle that accepted pre-ban 100 round beta mags, but you couldn’t transfer a pre-ban gun with a bullet button and a 30 round magazine. I guess they really hated bullet-buttons.

Semi-auto pistols also have a similar list:

“Any feature capable of functioning as a protruding grip that can be held by the non-trigger hand” (VFG again, but that’s already covered by the Federal AOW definition)

“A folding, telescoping, or thumbhole stock” (pretty much the definition of SBR and “not a handgun”)

“A shroud attached to the barrel, or that partially or completely encircles the barrel, allowing the bearer to hold the firearm with the non-trigger hand without being burned, but excluding a slide that encloses the barrel.” (Finally, we get close the original definition of a barrel shroud, like on a MAC-10 pistol)

“A muzzle brake or muzzle compensator” (politicians love recoil)

“The capacity to accept a detachable magazine at some location outside the pistol grip” (takes care of those pesky AR pistols and the ever classic Tec-9)

Semi-auto shotguns:

“Pistol grip only without a stock attached” (I’m curious if the Shockwave grip qualifies as an actual pistol grip or not, since I cannot find it defined by IL law)

“Any feature capable of functioning as a protruding grip that can be held by the non-trigger hand”

“A folding, telescoping, or thumbhole stock”

“A fixed magazine capacity in excess of 5 rounds”

“An ability to accept detachable [sic] magazine”

On page 3, line 14 they ban any shotgun with a revolving cylinder. This one hits home, since my Grandpa owns a Rossi Circuit Judge that he uses to hunt squirrels and rabbits. They literally want to ban my grandfather’s hunting shotgun.

Taking a note from the ATF on constructive possession. The bill bans “a conversion kit, part or combination of parts, from which an assault weapon can be assembled if those parts are in the possession or under the control of the same person;

Next comes the big, long list of guns banned by name, including “copies or duplicates” of those guns. There’s the usual list of machineguns and scary rifles that has been copy/pasted for years – AK, AKM, AK-47, AK-74, TEC-9, AR-15, Bushmaster XM-15, Uzi, etc. There are a few new additions to the list, like the [sic] Kel-Tec Sub Rifle, the Tavor, and most notably the Hi-point carbine. The most affordable home defense rifle available, specifically designed to comply with every single part of this law and others like it, has been specifically targeted for a gun ban. A Hi-point carbine ban is a direct attack on gun ownership for low-income families; those must desperate for a means of self-defense.

They then insert a specific exemption for “weapons designed for Olympic target shooting events” because of the Olympic sporting complex down in Sparta, and possibly the hopes of the Olympics ever coming to Chicago. These weapons and features all require banning for public safety, except public safety can take a back seat if you’re competing for the world stage and are bringing in money for Chicago.

The bill defines”.50 caliber cartridge” as .50 BMG, either by designation or actual measurement. .510 DTC wouldn’t fit this definition, since the case measurements are different, the cartridge is different. Muzzleloaders, antiques, and shotguns are exempted from the .50 caliber ban.

“Large capacity ammunition feeding device” defined as a magazine belt, drum, feed strip, or similar device that has a capacity of more than 10 rounds. Also includes constructive possession or readily restored or converted, so repair kits are out. Tube magazines for “.22 caliber rimfire” are exempt.

“Transfer means a delivery, loan, rental, or sale.” Transfers are only legal to an heir, an out-of-state resident, or an FFL. This definition creates another odd scenario. It would be illegal to rent a semi-auto assault weapon at a range, but perfectly legal to rent a fully-automatic machinegun, so long as it was supplied with 10 round magazines.

The sentences are, of course, all felonies. They’ll use this to take away your remaining rights, not only to effective self-defense, but to vote as well.

Delivering a banned magazine or “assault weapon attachment” is a class 4 felony for the first offense, class 3 for a second offense or more. Class 4 felonies are the least severe felonies in IL and carry a minimum prison term of one year. Class 4 felonies include felony DUI, aggravated assault, and stalking.

Transferring an assault weapon or .50 caliber rifle is a Class 3 felony. Class 3 felonies carry a sentence of two to five years in prison and up to $25,000 in fines. Examples are aggravated battery, and theft (between $300 and $2,000).

A second offense, or transferring 2 or more assault weapons, is a Class 2 felony. A Class 2 felony is punishable by three to seven years in prison and up to $25,000 in fines. Class 2 felonies include arson, and some drug possession (2 kg but not more than 5 kg of marijuana), as well as theft of $2,000 to $10,000.

It should be noted that according to the FBI, there were 14 murders in Illinois in 2016 that were committed with a rifle of any type, not just an assault weapon. 5 were committed with shotguns. These out of a total of 941 murders.

Grandpa handing me his hunting shotgun to go hunt squirrels in the woods would be the same as “Intentionally or knowingly [causing] great bodily harm, or permanent disability or disfigurement” in the eyes of the law.